The Green Room & Devi Collection

by Nag Mani

When her husband left for Ufrail, she was happy. Theirs was not a happy marriage, at least not for her. There was this initial fear that he would ask her to come along. He did throw hints once a while, and when he could no longer accept her silence, he even went ahead to pack some of her belongings. He did not ask or tell her to come along, just packed some of her clothes so that she would read between the lines and pack the rest on her own. It was in his farewell party that one of his colleagues asked if his wife was shifting with him. He told them that she was most eager to come along. It was then told to him that Ufrail was not a place for women. Though women themselves could never understand, as a husband it was his responsibility not to take her there, no matter how much she pleaded. It was for her own safety. Nevertheless, Manoj did not change his plan. But when Aditi heard about the condition the village was in and its infamous history of dacoits and murderers, she firmly refused to go. Manoj didn’t press her again. He settled 85 kilometres away in Ufrail, only to visit her on weekends.

  Now that Aditi was alone, she took out her books and started her preparation. At 28, she was thin and frail, and still eligible to sit for UPSC exams. Her husband never approved of it. Initially, she could not understand why. It took a while to realise that women cannot hold a post – or even aspire – superior than her husband’s. He never said it openly, just that he never gave her time or resources for her preparation. Aditi had wanted to become an Indian Administrative Officer the moment she saw one enter her school when she was in Class XII. She was always good in academics. She was the eldest of her three sisters and a brother, but unlike them, she was not fair and pretty. She was rather dark skinned, with bushy hair which she always kept tied. She was of average height and average features. After completing college, she wanted to prepare for IAS. But Marriage is the ultimate destination of a girl’s life and she was married to Manoj in ’95.

  And then Marriage happened.

  While Manoj was away, Aditi tended to her garden. She loved roses, and was a proud owner of twenty different shades and colours. Then she would study. She had been able to apply for the exam twice earlier but never had her admit card been delivered to her. She often wondered if Manoj received them and threw them away. Now that he was away, she assumed this would not happen. She would even go to the post office regularly when the time came. She brought out all her packed books and started her preparation. She made a “Daily Routine” and pasted it on a wall. Then she made study plans. Plans were set into practice. She thought she would make it this time.

  The manipulation to shift to Ufrail came in stages, one small piece at a time, so that she was taken off-guard. First came small complains. Manoj would visit her on weekends and blabber about the work conditions. There were only two other official staffs in the branch. One was on leave and the other was a year away from retirement and took it for granted, as no one wanted to spoil the work record of a colleague so close to the end of his career. Manoj practically ran the branch by himself.

  Then there was this unofficial assistant – Arvind. He was large and black and was in charge of maintaining and operating the bank’s generator that huffed and puffed throughout the day. He also cooked food for the managers and took care of their needs. Owing to his bulky size, he even accompanied them on field trips. He had been hired by some manager about eight-nine years ago and had stuck to the bank ever since. Other than procuring diesel, he also brought along villagers on promises of granting loans – instant approval, no hassle. Most of them didn’t have the required documents and when Manoj turned them away, Arvind would spend the entire day pleading him to accept their application. Due to lack of documents or securities, loan applications were rarely accepted and the villagers would leave abusing the banking system.

  Aditi spent her weekends listening to the various problems the village had in store. No electricity, because of which Manoj stayed back in the bank till as long as midnight. It at least had a fan and lots of work to do. The thin and old guard didn’t mind staying back so late, for he was seldom seen in the bank during daytime. Manoj’s house was far from comfortable. It was old and moist and suffocating. No one bothered to have it painted. It just had a bedroom, a hall, a kitchen and a small bathroom. The toilet was built in the back courtyard along with a cemented platform for a hand-pump and a room in one of the corners of the boundary wall. The room was locked and Manoj never bothered to tell her why.

  Weeks turned into months, and grumbles transformed into frustration. Manoj could not adjust to his new environment. His mother came to visit them during the onset of winter. He had turned weak and thin – something Aditi had failed to notice as the transformation had been gradual. Due to his irregular banking hours, Arvind had stopped cooking meals for him altogether. Manoj would hurriedly cook rice and pulses on a cheap kerosene stove and leave for the bank. Many a day he went without lunch. He would come late at night and eat the leftovers of the morning. The utensils were always dirty. The house needed thorough cleaning.

  Manoj managed to put up with the village because of his helpful neighbour Razzak. Razzak was a loan agent in the bank. Before working for Manoj, he and his two younger brothers used to drive rental vehicles. Their major income came from city dwellers who hired taxis to go to Nepal in search for exotic and cheap markets. He came in touch with Manoj when an auditor, sent to inspect the branch, put forward his desire to tour the neighbouring cities of Nepal in return for a commendable report. And ever since, Razzak gave up his driving job and started working for the bank. He brought loan-seekers to the office, cajoled Manoj into accepting their applications and helped them with the process on commission basis.

  One night, while serving dinner to Manoj and her mother-in-law, Aditi told him to hire a maid. Razzak could definitely arrange for one. Her mother-in-law dropped her jaw, shocked. “Maid? Hire a maid?” Then she clapped her palm over her head. “Mercy, oh god! Why do you not call me home? Do I have to live to see this day? All alone, my son… hire a maid? While this queen sits in her palace! And he can’t speak, oh, my son…”

  Manoj cleared his throat and gestured at his plate. He needed more rice. Like always, he didn’t say a word. And the conversation ended.

  A year after his transfer, he came home and told her he would commit suicide when he went back. Aditi had assumed that he would take time, but eventually, he would settle. But the problems were serious now. He had fresh bruises every time he came home, mostly on his shins and elbows. He had stopped using public transport to go to Ufrail and now rode his motorcycle – a blue Rajdoot. The road was rubble for the major part of the 42 kilometres stretch to Araria, but at least, it existed. The road then left the main city and cut through farms and fields and brick-kilns for a dozen kilometre or so and then it was all mud and treachery for another 30 kilometres through Forbesganj. Manoj often lost balance and fell, sometimes due to his own inexperience, but mostly due to a stray goat or a buffalo.

  Villagers would flock his house in the morning to withdraw cash or ask for loan or even write a letter or two to their sons in the foreign state of Punjab. And Razzak would come with his brothers to drive them away. Then there was this problem of electricity theft. The bank was near the main market of the village, and every evening, villagers swarmed around to buy fresh vegetable and gasping fish and blood-coated meat. Manoj had had a bulb installed in the market which was connected to the bank’s generator. Soon, the hawkers stripped naked its wire and began to connect their own bulbs. The money the bank gave for diesel began to fall short and when Manoj went out to have their connections removed, a rude mob encircled him. Frightened, he returned to his bank. The problem was sorted out when the Mukhiya, the head of the village, visited the bank for some work and was made aware of the fact that Manoj was considering cutting the line to market. No Bulb = No Tension. It was then that the Mukhiya ordered his men to beat up anyone seen using the connection to the bulb. He even went ahead to announce that no one would visit the manager’s house for office work. To make sure his words were taken serio
usly, he randomly pointed at a customer watching the scene from the bank and asked Razzak if he had ever seen him near their house. Turned out he had been standing in the queue just that morning. The men roughened him up and sent him home.

  But the most interesting problem was that present in the house. Manoj never said it openly, but it seemed that he heard a woman singing there on various nights. Sometimes he had strange dreams. Aditi guessed it was one of the reasons he stayed in the bank so late – so that he could stay away from his house. He was a firm believer of gods and attributed his dreams to the one thing he didn’t do when he entered the village. There were the ruins of an ancient temple in the village. Though no one worshipped there, many villagers had told him that since he was a newcomer, he should go there at least once and bow in front of the Devi. He wished to, but never got the time. It was only a few days before he came to Purnia that something happened one night – he never told her exactly what – and he ran out of the house, screaming. He told Aditi that he came out to raise an alarm for he thought it was a dacoit and that Razzak offered him to spend the night at his place. She knew it wasn’t a dacoit, for the very next morning it was not the police but the Mukhiya himself who paid him a visit and escorted him to the temple and watched over as he bowed in front of the shrine.

  Aditi felt guilty that her husband had to go through all this while she stayed back at home. Many a time she suspected that he was just making it all up. But the guilt lingered. So, little by little, Manoj obliged her to shift to Ufrail. Though, he never asked her to come.

  She packed her clothes and her books. Tore off the study pan. The “Daily Routine” fell to the floor and the maid swept it away some day. She cut a few stems of her red roses and wrapped them in moist mud. The house was rented to another banker with a fat wife and an ugly son. Manoj came back a month later to take her. She sat silently on her way to the bus-stand. He slept all along in the bus to Araria. But she couldn’t sleep. She thought of her flowering garden. She had paid the maid to take care of it. Her plants were her best friends. She didn’t miss her neighbours. Just her garden, and her house.

  It was going to be a tiring journey. She found a local magazine stuffed somewhere in Manoj’s bag. She was just skimming through its contents when one of the articles caught her attention. Growing up in a village, the story was not unfamiliar:

  Once upon a time there lived a rich man who had no son. He consulted old books, practiced traditional techniques and bought exotic herbs from any nomad claiming to know the secret to conceiving a male, but his wife bore him none. It was only after his sixth daughter that he heard of an ancient temple in a remote village. It was said that the devi of the temple granted any wish if she was promised a sacrifice worthy enough.

  He immediately left for the village. The temple was built on the roots of a very old and large peepal tree. The base of the trunk was coated with holy cow-dung. A pair of eyes were painted with vermilion and sandalwood, depicting the devi who had been residing in the tree for over a thousand years. After donating a ridiculously large amount of money to the priest, he knelt in front of the red eyes and promised the devi heads of eleven young goats if his wife gave birth to a son.

  By the end of the year, he was blessed with a baby boy.

  The family rejoiced the birth of the new born child. His sisters kissed him and fought with each other to hold him. His mother loved him the most and never let him out of her sight. His father threw parties to herald his birth. Everyone was absorbed in lavishly raising him. And the rich man forgot his promise.

  A year passed. Friends, neighbours and relatives gathered to celebrate his first birthday. A candle was placed upon a big, delicious cake and the youngest daughter lit a match-stick. But the candle wouldn’t burn. Then tried her elder sisters. One after the other, they lit match-sticks, but each failed to light the candle. The rich man scolded them and tried himself. Still, it wouldn’t burn. The guests eyed him impatiently. He was about to call for another candle when he noticed his son – his eyes had turned red… red like the vermilion eyes on the peepal tree.

  The baby was sick. His mother cried uncontrollably, but he remained silent in her lap. He did not cry, or move… or blink. He just stared at his father with his red eyes. The best of doctors were summoned, but the baby died before anyone could arrive. His eyes were still open. They were still staring at his father.

  Within a week all his business activities came crashing down. Helpless and bereaved, he held his head one night and slumped to the floor. But before tears would form, his wife came running to him. His youngest daughter had fallen sick. He rushed to her room. She was staring at him with the same red eyes. He did not call for any doctor. He arranged for eleven young goats and left for the temple immediately.

  The goats were washed and worshipped. Vermilion was smeared on their snouts and garlands were put around their necks. The youngest goat was chosen to be sacrificed first. Its legs were tied and head locked between two iron rods on a wooden post in front of the shrine. The priest began to strike the temple bell continuously. The red eyes watched. A swarthy man bowed to the goat and raised his sword…

  …but it wouldn’t fall.

  Something held it firmly!

  The devi wouldn’t accept the sacrifice.

  The swarthy man let go of the hilt, dropped to his knees and held his ears. Onlookers gasped and retreated, for the sword hovered in mid-air. The priest let out a scream. He knelt in front of the eyes and begged forgiveness. The blade fell clattering to the ground. The goats were released.

  The rich man somehow knew what he had to do next. He sat in front of the peepal tree and cut his palm. He collected his blood in a bowl and poured it on the roots of the tree. He sat there for eleven days, offering a bowl of his blood daily. His family pleaded him to come home. But he stayed. His youngest daughter revived on the twelfth day. But he couldn’t see her. He died on his way home.

  Aditi sighed and reclined on her seat. That was what happened when they dealt with powers beyond their control. From the many stories she had heard growing up, she knew that these powers didn’t interfere with anyone’s life unless given a reason to; but if someone did give them a reason, he had to live by the rules set by them.

  The bus stopped at a crossroad in Araria. There were small shops that sold local water-bottles and home-made food. A few vendors sold fly infected jalebi on the roadside. Young boys ran under the windows of every bus that stopped with peda and burfi stacked neatly on plates held high above their heads. Aditi watched buses and auto-rickshaws halt at the crossroad to pick up passengers, then linger a little to pick up a few more and drive away, continuing either straight or turning left. None of them turned right.

  Her bus stood at the right turn.

  The road ahead was narrower than the main road, but in better condition. The bus passed through a small, busy market with grocers and cloth-shops and hardware stores. Then the settlement gave way to a vast expanse of greenery. The road was raised and lined with tress on either side. Men, women and children worked on fields. The sky was blue and mostly clear, with only one dense white cloud resting in the west. A few colourful houses passed now and then. Then there were huts and brick-kilns and toiling people. The air was hot and marginally humid. The conductor shouted something, probably the name of the stop about to come. Manoj was sleeping on her shoulder. The road was a mere clearing in the fields and greenery around, when all of a sudden it turned and stopped at another crossroad with another sprawl of huts and shops and faded signboards. A small waiting hall had been erected what seemed a long time ago for weary travellers. Only a dog now slept on the crumbling seats.

  The conductor approached them. Though she was wide awake and eyeing him enquiringly, he chose to wake up Manoj. “Sir, here. Your stop. Forbesganj.”

  They stepped down from the bus parked carelessly in a congested market and marched to the rear. The conductor pulled out two suitcases, five bags and five large cartons. An auto-rickshaw was hired and they set
off again. She held onto a plastic handle hovering above her. Up and down went the auto-rickshaw, bouncing through busy markets and narrow lanes. The land opened out again and they made their way in between fields and farms.

  They came out into a clearing and halted abruptly. A river cut across the land in front of them, its water brown and swift, confined to the deeper part of a wide bed. The road broke into patches of grass and weed and ran ahead over a red, rusted iron bridge that projected out almost till the middle of the river before twisting around and coming to an adventurous end. All that remained of the bridge on the other side were broken ends of four concrete pillars. The driver restarted the engine and rolled the vehicle to the right. A little way up the river another bridge had been built, but instead of concrete pillars and red coated iron, it was made of large bags of sand placed skilfully over hollow cylinders of concrete, held in place by sections of bamboo poles tied together. Up ahead near the middle of the river, Aditi noticed that there were no cylinders, instead the sand bags were piled on thick wooden planks. Heaps and heaps of mud had been placed over the bridge, and what once must have been a fairly smooth road, now seemed on the verge of caving in. On the other end of the bridge, a mud-path rose steeply at least twenty feet to meet a brick-road that led to the village. There was no rickshaw on the other side. The rest of the journey seemed to be on foot.

  The driver began to take out their luggage. Aditi saw an old man sitting on an abandoned pillar, watching them curiously. Few children were playing by the river bank and a herd of cows and goats grazed in the shade of a dense bamboo thicket further up the river.

  “Driver sahib,” the old man called out in a hoarse voice. The children stopped their pranks and looked up. “Madam will walk all the way to village? And you will sit in your useless tempo and watch her?”

  “The bridge is dangerous to cross, baba!” the driver shouted back. “It’s all so heavy. Three people. Luggage.” He looked at Manoj, probably asking him to reason out with the old man. The fact that the deal was to drop them only till there didn’t seem a valid reason. “Vehicle will fall in the river!”